Friday, August 26, 2011

A prominent French intellectual's j'accuse against a nation that accepts lies to justify war, while extra-marital sex is the equivalent of 'national betrayal'

A provocative piece in Le Monde -- a French intellectual tries to comprehend America's twisted sexual values, here: http://www.worldcrunch.com/making-war-not-love-french-view-sex-america-abu-ghraib-dsk/3642Excerpt: "The worst consequence of this DSK case is that, if it is confirmed that the complainant didn’t tell the truth, it would disqualify the real victims of rape who will be suspected of lying. Both the media and justice system will come out of this case with their stature reduced, even if the prosecutor Cyrus Vance honestly recognized from July that there were inconsistencies in the alleged victim’s version of events.

"There’s little hope that after the judge dismissed the case, the biggest U.S. press organizations who lynched the former IMF Director before he was judged, would ever apologize.

"To my fellow French who are planning to go to the United States: BE CAREFUL. If you ever want to flirt with an American citizen, male or female, you need to get an official document from them stipulating that you can enjoy their body. We have a lot to learn from our Americans friends, but certainly not the art of loving."

And this: "The US is home to a peculiar phenomenon that never happened in Europe: American feminists have allied with the very conservative American right. These two forces united in the name of different interests to stop what was achieved in the 1960’s and 1970’s in the field of women’s rights. Feminist intellectuals such as Joan Scott, an expert in French-bashing, have become propagandists for the United State State Department. They are in charge of promoting the American way of life. This explains the moral McCarthyism that prevails in American society when it comes to the issue of love, and which has been denounced by the more clear-sighted Americans for a long time.

"It is clearly a furious condemnation of sexual pleasures by criminalizing the heterosexual act. Every man is a rapist, every woman may be a victim. The flattering remark is a first step to harassment, seduction is on the road to rape, gallantry is a euphemism to blur the man’s predatory moves."